Category Archives: China

Update II: Wear A Turban, Not A Tux (Transparency)

Barack Obama, Celebrity, China, Democrats, Foreign Policy, Government

Wikipedia: “A state dinner is a dinner or banquet paid by a government [read: taxpayers] and hosted by a head of state in his or her official residence in order to renew and celebrate diplomatic ties between the host country and the country of a foreign head of state or head of government who was issued an invitation.”

In the tradition of celebrating “crap countries” (Ali G. vernacular), BO’s first state dinner is in honor of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Why not? One of BO’s first major addresses as president was delivered in “Egypt’s capital, early in June. There, the president prostrated himself before the Muslim world, offering up prolix praise for the religion of peace.”

President Bush hosted a glittery gala for the same Singh only four years ago.

You the taxpayer most certainly cannot press your nose against the White House windows to get a glimpse of the well-fed, celebrity guests. You’ll have to be content to read about them HERE.

To give credit where its due, when asked “about the tense relationship between India and Pakistan,” Obama said “it was not the role of the United States to intervene and solve such problems.”

That’s all well and good, but then what is he doing beefing up American presence in Afghanistan?

Update I: On the other hand, here’s the neoconservative foreign-policy perspective on Indian-American bond from The Heritage Foundation, chief of which is “the Indo-Pakistani regional rivalry,” terrorism, and, of course, an acknowledgment of the Chinese threat:

“President Obama rightly took advantage of an opportunity to reaffirm ties to India and recognize the U.S.-India partnership as one of the “defining partnerships of the 21st century.” The two countries now need to follow through on their leaders’ pronouncements on a range of issues including education, trade, health, energy, defense, nuclear nonproliferation, space, and the environment.” …

“President Obama hopefully took the opportunity in his private meeting with Singh to provide reassurances that the U.S. is attuned to Indian strategic concerns vis-à-vis China, particularly their ongoing border disputes and Chinese efforts to extend its influence into South Asia. Over the last three years, China has increasingly pressured India over their disputed borders by questioning Indian sovereignty over the state of Arunachal Pradesh and by stepping up probing operations along different parts of their shared frontier.”

Update II (Nov. 25): Transparency. Don’t expect it. Yesterday, the adoring sycophants at CNN—in particular, Anderson Cooper’s fittingly dim sidekick—were salivating for footage from BO’s party, only to be told by a fawning colleague that the administration was not allowing the press to take pics of the prez and his party. Feasts and festivities amid hunger and hardship across the country don’t make for the best optics.

Big Brother Bernanke

China, Debt, Economy, Federal Reserve Bank

Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke “urged Asian leaders to build better pension systems and to increase government spending and the Obama administration to address the U.S. budget deficit,” reports the Wall Street Journal.

The audacity did not stop there. The “rebalancing of global growth,” as Bernanke put it, could not be achieved if the Chinese persisted in their errant practices:

“Trade surpluses achieved through policies that artificially enhance incentives for domestic saving and the production of export goods distort the mix of domestic industries and the allocation of resources,” and yield “an economy that is less able to meet the needs of its own citizens in the longer term.”

This from the man who, together with his predecessor, is responsible for distorting production and consumption in the largest economy in the world.

World leaders are coming to “a growing consensus … on the need to rebalance global economic growth so it depends less on U.S. consumers.”

Besides, who made Bernanke the crime boss of the world?

Updated: The Dollar Dethroned

China, Debt, Economy, Federal Reserve Bank, Political Economy

As has been lamented on this space time and again, the trashing of the dollar by the Bush/Barack soul mates has resulted in the currency’s demise as “the bedrock of world trade.”

It’s a slow and sad demise: “The latest sign of the ground shifting beneath our feet is [the report by the Independent today] of plans by Gulf states, China, Russia, France and Japan to end their practice of conducting oil deals in US dollars, switching instead to a diverse basket of currencies.”

“It is not hard to see the motivation for oil exporters to move away from the dollar. The value of the US currency has fallen sharply since last year’s meltdown. And fears are growing, in the light of a spiralling US government deficit, that a further depreciation is likely. They do not want to sell their wares in return for a currency with an uncertain future.”

“It is also easy to see why China would like a world trading system that is underpinned by other currencies as well as the dollar. For the past decade Beijing has been recycling the proceeds of its giant national trade surplus into purchases of US government bonds and other dollar-denominated assets. China too stands to make a significant loss if the value of the dollar falls. For China, however, the timing is much more sensitive. Beijing needs to reduce its dollar holdings, but if it does so too quickly it will bring about the very devaluation it fears. This explains why Chinese officials appear to want this transition to take place gradually over the next decade.”

[SNIP]

The usual tele-Demopublicans will depict this economic impetus as an act of political treachery. But what else can these nations do? Fall on their proverbial swords for the US?

Update (Oct. 7): “Stop printing money,” “We don’t care what you think,” and “You’re a moron”: This is a sweet sample of the heckling that greeted Rep. Steve Israel (D-Huntington), during a healthscare townhall meeting. It’s always encouraging when protesters associate a massive new government program with the debt (dah!), the demise of the dollar, and ultimate economic ruin. I know; this seems obvious to readers on this space, but signs that such basic comprehension is spreading are to be celebrated.

Dissing The Dalai Dodo

Barack Obama, Celebrity, China, Hollywood, Pop-Culture

Members of the fashionable left generally line up for the Dalai Lama. That’s why Obama is making such a song-and-dance of dissing the old dodo, famous for his fortune-cookie profundities and for giving celebrity airheads “intellectual” arsenal.

Dissing: Da Man will not be meeting with Da Dalai “during the Lama’s five-day trip to the U.S. capital beginning on Monday, the first time in 18 years the exiled Tibetan leader has visited Washington without seeing the president,” reports Yahoo News.

Dodo-in-chief doesn’t want to annoy our biggest creditors: China.

So long as Clueless Clooney and Bono are still welcome at the White House, we’re all safe.

I almost forgot. Read more about the One Who Is Lauded By The Lame—whence come the Lama’s pseudo-spiritual qiups; who financed him as he sat on his well-robed behind, etc.—in “Deifying The Dalai Lama.”